The first season of House of Cards was extraordinary television. Frank’s and Claire’s ambition, their intelligence and their controlled advance toward their goal launched the entire show beyond ordinary concerns and into a realm that recalled Shakespeare.

After sitting through the first few episodes of season three, that description sounds exaggerated to me: how could the show I’m watching now have been that good in that first season? It’s hard to believe because the subsequent seasons have shrunk down to mere roman à clef cleverness and posturing.

In that first season, Frank was a post-Nietzschean MacBeth unencumbered by conscience. Now he’s just mean, desperate, and listless. I’m so uninterested that I don’t expect I’ll even finish the season.